


Breath of Fresh Air

by fairyuphoria



Category: Dan Howell - Fandom, Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst, Death, Fluff, M/M, Reincarnation, meningitis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-08
Updated: 2016-03-08
Packaged: 2018-05-25 13:28:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6196831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fairyuphoria/pseuds/fairyuphoria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan decides to get some fresh air at a park, when a ball rolls into his feet, that just so happens to belong to a small energetic child who reminds him of someone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breath of Fresh Air

 

Dan had taken Phil's death extremely hard when it had first happened, I mean how couldn't he, he was his best friend, love of his life, and if you believed in them, soulmate. It was something no one saw coming, and it shook the YouTube community hard, as well as the fan base, not to mention friends and family of Phil's. Yet, everyone could agree the person it hit the hardest was Dan, who had not even two weeks before, proposed to the older boy, something he had always dreamed of doing, marrying his best friend finally, starting a life together, and the night he proposed they talked about that future on Dan's bed. They spoke of what they wanted their house to look like, something not too big but not too small, full of house plants and little knick knacks collected from their travels, they agreed they'd need at least three bedrooms, one for them to finally share, one for an office, and one for the family they wanted to start in the future. That topic brought on a conversation both of them were excited to discuss, they had obviously talked about it before but in that moment it had felt real, it wasn't just a dream, they weren't talking in ifs and possiblys, it was a reality, something that was going to happen in the future. Dan had always wanted three kids, Phil was okay with this, even though he would prefer two, but three was starting not too sound so bad, they even talked about baby names, though they knew having children wasn't going to happen anytime extremely soon, but they were caught in the magical dreamy feeling of what could be the future. They decided they liked Eve and Olive (Oli for short), for girls name, Atlas and Benjamin, for boys. They were caught up in their own little fantasy, so when the sickness came, it was like a hurricane, uprooting all of their plans, shocking them as they choked on water.

The date was May 30th, just after they had gotten back from Playlist live, a week and four days since Dan had proposed, and Phil woke up with the worst headache of his life. It struck his whole body, it was a pounding around his whole head, behind his eyes, and his whole body ached, and Dan knew something was wrong when he woke up and the sheets were drenched in sweat.

"How about your neck," Dan mumbled softly, trying not to be too loud as he sat on the bed with his laptop, entering all of Phil's symptoms into WebMD. "Is it stiff?"

  
Phil was silent for a while, laying on his back, eyes scrunched up in pain, letting out a small shaky huff before replying. "I..." He begins, "Yes, everything hurts, Dan."

Dan frown deepened looking at the older man in so much pain, he had never seen his so sick and pale looking, it was really starting to worry him. After a few more very slow, confused, answers to questions Dan asked, his worst suspicion was confirmed, when Meningitis was the top result, the bar nearly completely full next to the name.

"Phil, we're going to go to the hospital, okay, do you think you can stand up and get down the stairs? I can carry you if you want," Dan whispered to the other.

  
Phil made a disagreeing noise, "Carry, please, I... can't stand."

Dan wasn't the fittest person, he knew, but Phil was lighter than him, and he knew that if he had to he would make himself be able to carry him. Half way down the hallway was when Phil began to push Dan away from him.

"Dan, Dan, I'm gonna throw up, I-" Phil struggled out, trying to get out of Dan's arms so not to throw up on him, but thankfully Dan knew what was coming and rushed him into the nearest room, the kitchen, where Phil leaned over the trash can.

  
Grabbing a bowl for Phil to carry for the rest of the journey, in case he would need to vomit again, they continued the hard decent down the stairs until they were finally able to get out the front door, where the Uber that Dan had ordered before hand was waiting on the street in front of their flat.

That night everything came crashing down, and Phil began to get weaker, responses becoming little, Dan was instructed to wear a white hospital mask around him, which made Phil begin to cry when seeing Dan approach his bed side.

Dan couldn't stop staring at him, whether it was from behind a curtain when the nurses had asked him to step outside, or it was from the chair right next to his bed, his eyes never left him, and he couldn't get over out weak her looked. His skin turned a white he had never seen on him before, a countless amount of wires and needles stuck into him, making him look like some kind of robot, he looked broken, fragile, and Dan was scared to touch him.

After a lumbar puncture, in which Dan began to finally cry for the first time that night after seeing Phil muffle a yelp as a two inch needle slid between the plates of his spin, a doctor knocked on the outside wall of Phil's room, before entering, clipboard in hand.

"Phil Lester?" The doctor questioned, Dan nodded for Phil, as he knew he wouldn't be able to. "Hello, I'm Dr. Welch, you are?"

"Dan Howell, I'm his fiance," Dan almost whispered, feeling out of place in the much too white room with the much too sick Phil loosely holding his hand.

  
"Ah, I see, well, we have the results from the lumbar puncture," She began, pulling up a chair to sit next to Dan and face Phil.

  
Phil's eyes slightly opened to peak at the doctor, trying to judge her reaction and get a slight idea of how bad it was, maybe it's just a really bad flu and not meningitis at all, Phil thought, I heard flu is really bad this year. "What's wrong with me?" Phil managed to mumble.

"Judging by the data we got from the lumbar puncture, your white blood cells are at an extreme, a usual healthy human has only 5-10 white blood cells, someone with the flu has about 5-10 or lower as it's a virus, but you have 6,300 WBC in what we took from you," Dr. Welch stated, looking between the two boys as if to judge their reaction.

  
"What does that mean?" Dan questioned.

  
Dr. Welch sighed, tilting her head slightly, pushing up her too-box looking glasses, before speaking, "We only get this high of numbers when we are dealing with a bacterial illness, meaning it's an illness caused by bacteria, which are the hardest to cure, as well as the most tough on a person, apposed to a viral illness, which is just a virus, like your average cold. Bacterial illness spread extremely quickly to the vital organs, and can sometimes be stopped with the use of antibiotics but even then it's difficult."

Dan sat quietly for a moment, "Then what's his diagnosis," He stated bluntly.

"We are assuming he has Bacterial Meningitis," She frowns. "It's one of the most deadly illnesses, but since the improvement of modern medicine, we have many ways of treating it, and we will do all that we can to help Phil."

  
She then proceeded to explain just what meningitis was to the two, saying it is the inflammation of the membranes around your brain and spinal chord, telling them the potential threats that could happen to Phil with all of this, including loss of hearing, memory loss, learning disabilities, brain damage, seizures, and death.

Dan cried, and he cried hard. Phil shed a few tears out of fear and seeing Dan cry. After they had called down Dan called to update Phil's family on what was happening and to tell them to come as there was no telling what could happen.

And the hospital day went in a blur for Dan, a blur of faces, of Phil's family, of Phil's hands, of talking words of encouragement of Phil, of needles, of weird clear substances being hooked to Phil's IV, to Phil crying and throwing up, to his own tears, until it got interrupted by flat-lining and nurses, pushing, and Dan wasn't sure if he was yelling or crying or both, but the nurses pushed him out of the curtained wall into the hallway with the rest of Phil's family, where Martyn had to hold him back from running in, crying into Dan's back already as they sunk to the tiled floor together in a furry of tears.

The time then was April 1st, 2016, 12:45am.

The time now is April 3rd, 2020, 2:45pm.

It has been four years since Phil's death and Dan still was heartbroken about Phil, but he had long since come to terms with the fact, and remembered Phil with happy memories, the first year and a half had been very hard, but he knew now mopping and mourning wouldn't be what Phil would've wished upon him.

So here Dan stood, or more walked, in a park in London, he had moved out of their old flat, into one of his own with a flatmate named, Marie, who he adored, and he was truly happy, he could say that. Sure, he would be 10x more happy with Phil by his side, but considering the circumstances, he was the happiest he had been in years.

So he strolled down the sidewalk, in deep thought, a smile tainting his lips, when he felt a small pressure hit his foot, seeing a small blue ball roll into his right foot, bending down to pick it up, glancing around to find the owners, only to see a small boy clumsily running towards him.

"I'm sorry, sir," He mumbled to Dan, looking up at him with wide sky colored eyes. "Wow, you're tall."

  
Dan chuckled, crouching done to be a little less tall, but even at this position, he was a bit taller than the small child. "It's okay, is this your ball?"

The child nodded his head in excitement, giving him a toothy grin. "Yes! It's my favorite color, blue! I got it for my birthday, it was two days ago," He eagerly told Dan, holding up his little chubby fingers up to show the number two.

"Oh really? How old did you turn?" Dan couldn't help the smile that continued to spread crossed his face as he spoke with this outgoing child.

  
He proceeded to add two more fingers onto the two he was already holding up, "Four! That's really old."

"Wow, that is old, but I'm ancient, can you guess how old I am?" Dan raised an eyebrow at him.

  
"Hm," He humbled, placing a pale finger onto his pressed lips in thought. "Ten?"

  
Dan laughed, shaking his head. "No, I'm ancient! I'm 27!"

"You're really old! My dog, Susan, is 28 in dog years."

  
"Oh, Susan? That's a funny name for a dog. Are dogs your favorite animals?"

  
"Nope! They're my fourth favorite, my first favorite is a lion," He stated excitedly, pointing to the cartoon lion on the blue shirt he was wearing.

  
Dan's heart felt heavier the more similarities he began to notice between the small boy and Phil, it was actually scary, he was born the day Phil had died, favorite color blue, favorite animal a lion, and his dog's name is Susan, a name Phil seemed to be obsessed with when naming their fake future animals. Dan tried to shake it off, leaving it to pure coincidence.

"What's your favorite animal?" The boy poked Dan's knee.

  
"I quite like llamas, actually," Dan smiled.

  
"Oh! Llamas are really funny looking, I like them too. What's your name?"

"Dan."

  
"I have a friend named Dan at school! But he likes to go by Daniel, which I think is a funny, Dan is nicer, I like Dan," He talked like he was thinking out loud, and he tried not to let it remind him of how Phil used to speak when he was sleepy and not worried about what he was saying.

  
Right before Dan was going to reply by asking his name, an older women, about Dan's age wandered up to the two. "There you are, I've been looking for you everywhere, you worried me sick! What have I told you about wondering off," The women scolded the boy, taking hold of his hand, glancing at Dan suspiciously.

"Sorry Mummy, my ball rolled in my new friend Dan! Say hi mummy!" The boy looked up with excitement at his mum, pointing over to Dan, who stood up quickly, brushing himself off and holding out his hand to his mum.

  
"Hi, I'm Dan, as he said, sorry about that, his ball just rolled into my foot and he started telling me about his favorite animals, he seems like a lovely boy," Dan smiled at her as she shook his hand.

  
"I'm Mel, and no, don't apologize, I'm sorry about that, he just loves talking to everyone and anyone," Mel shook her head, smiling down at the boy at her side. "But thank you for keeping him over here while I was searching for him, I don't know where he would've roamed without you."

"Absolutely no problem, it was my pleasure," Dan nodded politely at her, and he meant it when it was no problem.

  
"Well, I suppose we should get going, little Phil is getting closed to his nap time, huh?" Mel glanced down at Phil who was yawning, and Dan's stomach dropped at the name, heart beginning to race, neck getting hot.

  
"Wow... that name, how did you decide on it?" Dan couldn't help but ask, in a breathless voice.

  
Mel looked a little confused by the question and the change of his deminor."It's actually funny you ask, we didn't mean to name him that at all, we had a name all picked out, James, and then the night he came into the world, I, for whatever reason, just had a feeling he was Philip instead, and I feel that it fits him perfectly," She smiles, ruffling Phil's hair.

Dan hummed, "Well it was wonderful meeting you and your wonderful little boy, I hope you have a nice day!"

They said their goodbyes and Dan continued to walk though the park his heart continued to thump in his chest but he couldn't help the smile that was on his face.

Dan never believed in religion or anything of 'heaven and hell', he thought, once you died, you died, and that was it, you get one chance, and after that it's just done with and you as a person disappear. But reincarnation was always an interesting concept to Dan, he wasn't sure if he believed in it before, but there was something in his chest that told him that this wasn't just a 'coincidence'.

And he took this as it was and smiled knowing that maybe, just maybe, Phil was alive, just not his 'Phil'.

FIN!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! This is kinda shit bc I hadn't written in so long when I wrote this, but regardless I hope your enjoyed.


End file.
